News Here's what I got from yesterday's bill signing

[tribdog]

I'm talking about the bill that closes guantanamo and says we won't torture prisoners anymore.
As far as the bill itself goes I think it looks better than it actually is. Yes Guantanamo should be closed and yes we shouldn't torture people, but where are the people at guantanamo going to be sent? Probably to countries where they will be tortured. the bill isn't the most important thing that happened though. Obama actually read the bill out loud, explained what it meant and then signed it. I know its a little early to start erasing the picture of Jesus on all the crucifixes and replacing it with a picture of Obama, but dammit I really like the guy. I wonder how many bills will be signed this same way because I love the idea. I'm so sick of lying scheming politicians. I supported Obama because i felt like I could trust him, today reinforced that feeling.

 

[russ_watters]

Well it is certainly going to be problematic, but finding countries to accept them is not something that concerns me much. From today's paper, exactly the reason why we don't just want to dump these guys back onto the street (in whatever country):

A Saudi man who was released from Guantanamo after spending six years inside the U.S. prison camp has joined al-Qaeda's branch in Yemen and is now the terror group's No. 2 in the country, according to a purported Internet statement from al-Qaeda.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2009-01-23-gitmo-friday_N.htm

 

[Alfi]

The Internet statement, which could not immediately be verified...

Does that not mean that all statements in/on that web page are also NOT verified?
Have they subsequently been verified?

 

[BobG]

Well it is certainly going to be problematic, but finding countries to accept them is not something that concerns me much. From today's paper, exactly the reason why we don't just want to dump these guys back onto the street (in whatever country):


http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2009-01-23-gitmo-friday_N.htm

Not all of them should be released. The only requirement is some efficiency while adhering to human rights standards. Failing to do the latter puts a serious crimp in resolving the current situation.

That drops things into the cost-benefit analysis realm. It's not important that one former detainee went on to a high ranking position in al-Qaeda. It's important how many former detainees will go on to be American enemies and how significant will their actions be. That has to be balanced by how many new recruits can be obtained by capitalizing on the Guantanamo image and how significant their actions will be.

One former detainee planning a terrorist mission that would have been planned by someone else if the former detainee were absent has no impact at all.

Having ten former detainees carry out suicide missions, thereby increasing the number of missions from 10 to 20 is pretty significant. Is it more significant than increasing the number of missions from 90 to 100?

Acquiring 10 new recruits because of the Guantanamo image would have a similar impact to the former detainees (whatever that is).